Dancing toward freedom

My journey in dancing tientos reflects my larger path in flamenco: searching for truth and freedom. What do I mean by that? To not imitate others, but to understand flamenco and my own body so well that I am free to express my interpretation of the music in the moment. 

I’m lucky enough to be able to say I’ve been dancing my tientos for 20 years. The way I dance it now probably has little in common with the first tientos I performed, but it’s one continuous thread. Incrementally, I have become the dance and the dance has become me.

Last week, I participated in Flamenco Vivo’s Certamen, an international dance competition. I used the opportunity to push my artistry in the sphere of the tablao, synthesizing the experimentation I’ve been doing that is really outside of flamenco’s norms with my flamenco training, combining my corporal knowledge with my flamenco musical knowledge in new ways that felt like they gave me a taste of that freedom I search for in my dancing. I danced por tientos. 

Here’s how I saw my own growth in preparing for this competition:

Colleague and mentor Marija Temo encouraged me to use my own steps in the competition, not just steps from others I’d tweaked to be more organic to me. So I let that be my own personal challenge. So I pushed myself to do just that. But I didn't start from zero:

I’ve been working a lot on new choreography with Felise Bagley. First, I took a footwork phrase I’d made up for our piece and used it between the verses of tientos. I stylized it to be more aesthetically flamenco by marking tientos accents in my torso and made sure it fit in the musical measures of tientos. I found it more musically interesting than the phrase I’d cut and pasted from material I’ve learned over the years. And it’s me - the step is an accumulation of the footwork that has stuck with me and the musicality I hear in tientos. 

Next, I wanted to change my opening call - I started by adding very different arms, arm movement taken from an in-depth choreographic process with Felise. That process entailed exploring movement whilst carrying a prop; then we took away the prop, and the arms remained. In rehearsal one day, we worked on adding those arms to a footwork phrase - breaking away from the standard flamenco arm movements that are second nature to me. So, that evening, as I rehearsed for the certamen, I added those arms to the opening llamada (call). It led to me using my head/focus more clearly, and to new spatial orientations. I felt like I was finally free while dancing because I was no longer limited to conventional body movements while I performed necessary musical communication in the structure of the dance. The call suddenly told its own story and every part of the llamada felt connected - not upper and lower body separated. 

Here’s the text I sent Felise that night:

In the process of working on that llamada, I experimented with new footwork phrases. The arms somehow inspired different rhythmic phrasing. I ended up using that footwork as the beginning of the escobilla (footwork section). I then would send the snippets of new footwork phrasing to Marija Temo for feedback - she gave me ideas to make the phrases build better and less “square.” 

In the letras (verses) - which I rarely set, much of the choreography from the piece Felise and I have been working on came out naturally. It’s at the surface of my brain and body, and I could pull it out as the guitar inspired me to do so. I am so grateful for the opportunity to translate new movement back into flamenco, widening my vocabulary, my ability to use the space, my levels, subtlety and nuance, to translate flamenco to different planes of orientation, and get me closer to freedom. To not be restricted by movement habits or norms, but to move freely as one with the music and truthfully. To be able to react to the music with a full sense of body, presence of mind and spirit comes from this approach (at least for me). Freedom in dance is not doing anything in the moment - there is phrasing and musical knowledge and a connectivity, choices consciously being made as ways to embody the music. I’ve expanded both the knowledge of my own body and what it can do, allowing me to not just regurgitate other people’s movements. 

I also challenged myself to not set the choreography outside the calls and the opening of the escobilla. I let José Moreno sing whatever he wanted, and he sang me some very irregular letras, but with all his heart, which made me both listen more closely and dance more fully and in the moment. I’m also grateful to Marija for this - her method of teaching cante (including having me sing basic scales over and over when I began studying with her) helped me to not just follow cante, but anticipate the contour of the verse so I can be one with it in the moment. The very things I’d went to Spain on the Fulbright for I found answered by a singer/guitarist in the Midwest these past few years. 

Leading up to the competition, I was reminded of this quote I used to carry around in my wallet: 

After the competition, I received some very encouraging feedback from artists I deeply respect. A big one I received from several people was that having the courage to go up there and dance as myself is something I should be very proud of, and I am. The years of exploring my own body, movement possibilities, and challenging my artistry rather than imitating other peoples’ steps has been my focus for as long as I can remember. I never wanted to be a copy of another dancer. I wanted to find out what my dancing is, what my limits are and defeat those limits or push them further, and the best part of that is there is no end to that exploration. It takes an extra bit of courage to dance outside the box as a non-Spaniard too.

And even after the competition, the growth continues:

Marija Temo continued her advising as we watched the video together a few days after, going through every little detail. What worked well, what could be improved. Some things she was just curious about - why did I choose to do x or y. And some (or many) of the things were in the moment decisions that for the most part worked out really well. And she gave me advice on things to continue working on - more ways to develop my own footwork phrases especially, which I look forward to exploring. 

There is always more to learn in flamenco. And while that may be frustrating at moments, it inspires me to keep pushing - exploring, asking questions, creating, getting out of my comfort zone.

I’m so grateful for my journey that has not only brought me to the people who had the answers to the questions and pathways I have been seeking, but to a way of dancing that is more free and has allowed me to find out who I am as an artist. 

Photo from the Certamen by Lisa Greenberg Photography